Thursday, June 25, 2015

Serving God and Empowering Women

The inevitable finally happened. Rabbi Avi Weiss has dispensed
with his prior refusal to call his female ordainees ‘rabbis’. I challenged him to stop dancing around that
title with made up titles (like Raba and
Maharat) and he finally rose to the challenge.

His motivation in not calling them outright rabbis was the
realization that the Orthodox establishment would not accept a female rabbi, no
matter how much her learning qualified her to be one. The Rabbinical Council of
America (RCA) admonished him when he even came close by calling Sara Hurwitz (his first
ordainee), rabba, a feminized version of rabbi.

They told him that he would be expelled from the RCA if he ever
did that again. He quickly agreed and reverted to his original title, the less
offensive Maharat, a Hebrew acronym meaning spiritual leader. He then established
a school for that purpose calling it Yeshivat Maharat with Rabba Hurwitz as its
head. (For the record, Rabbi Weiss is no longer a member of the RCA.)

I had always maintained that calling a female rabbinic ordainee by
any other name made her no less a full fledged rabbi. Which is why I challenged
Rabbi Weiss to stop dancing around that title. He nevertheless stuck to the
title Maharat. Until now.

Rabbi Weiss has now dropped all pretenses.

Yeshivat Maharat ordains
women. Three graduating classes have come forth from that school. This year for
the first time they are calling it a Semicha ceremony (Chag Semicha) and being
given the degree all Orthodox Musmachim get, Yoreh Yoreh. Which states (based
on my own Yoreh Yoreh Semicha document) that they studied Gemarah and Poskim diligently;
passed exams; may now rule on matters of
Jewish law; and can be called a Rav in Israel. It also states that they can now accept a position
in any community as a rabbi.

Accordingly, Rabbi Weiss has told his Maharat graduates that
if they choose to use the title rabba or rabbi because it suited their
circumstances, that was just fine with him. One of his recent graduates has
actually done that.

Ladies and gentleman,
I present you with the first American Orthodox female rabbi, Lila Kagedan. She
is one of this year’s 6 graduates of Yeshivat Maharat. Rabbi Kageden now joins Rabbis
Sally Presiand (Reform), Sandy Eisenberg Sasso (Reconstructionist), and Amy
Elberg (Conservative) as a pioneer in their respective denominations. She has
finally broken the glass ceiling of the Orthodox rabbinate.

This must have thrilled Orthodox Jewish feminists all
over the world. As human rights consultant Karen Mock put it in her CJN article:

As I sang and danced and celebrated with Lila and her
family, I was moved to tears…

I have expressed my antipathy for ordaining women here many
times. I am not going to rehash all my arguments against it except to say that
these woman will never be accepted into mainstream Orthodoxy. Not in the
Charedi world and not in the Centrist world of Modern Orthodoxy. The RCA has
stood firm on this issue and has clearly stated its opposition to it as a
violation of our Mesorah (tradition).

These 2 bodies (Charedim and Centrists) comprise the vast
majority of the Orthodox Jewish world. Leaving only the fringes of the left wing to
accept it. A fringe that in my view has long ago abandoned the Mesroah of their
teachers… and possibly Orthodoxy itself.

There is one area I would like to address, however. I have
been accused of misunderstanding the true motives of the women that do things
like this. I have been told that I have no right to ascribe illegitimate motives
since I can’t read their minds. How can I know what they are thinking? I have
been told very clearly by their defenders - people that know them and know how
sincere they are - that I am wrong.

I have been told time and again that these
women are completely L’Shma and are
doing all this only to serve God in the best way they can. Why have they chosen
modalities of men? I have been told that that these are Mitzvos that they know actually exist and choose them as the best way to serve God in ways meaningful to themselves. They know it is a Mitzvah at some level since
it is mentioned in the Torah. Indeed there are many Mitzvos women are not
required to do - that men are. And they do those with permission and reward. And
thus they feel they have a right to do any of those they wish. Whether there is a Mesorah about women doing it or not.

But I always say, Judaism is not about rights. It’s about
obligations. So that even if someone has a right to serve God in ways they are
not required to, it doesn’t mean they always should. Especially if it has no tradition
to it. It is more in line with God’s wishes to serve Him in the ways
he commanded them to serve. Focusing instead on
other even permissible service - instead
of trying to find ways to improve their mandated service is in my view misguided.

Something that seems meaningful to an individual – even if it is based on the
fact that it is mandated by God to a specific segment of His people does not mean that it is always meaningful to
Him when non mandated segments do it. Sometimes what seems like a legitimate service to God is in fact completely unacceptable to Him.

There is an event in the Torah that illustrates this
fact. Much like Orthodox feminist women, Aaron’s sons, Nadav and Avihu had similar
motivations. Sacrifices being known to be pleasing to God they were inspired to act on their own and offer God an unasked
for sacrifice. They were instantly
killed for that.

How could it be that an
act designed to please God based on what they knew about such acts would end up
being their demise? When Chazal analyzed this event, they concluded that
Nadav and Avihu were not as L‘Shma as this event made them seem on the surface.
I think we can learn from this that personal feelings about how to serve God are
not always right. Sometimes they are very wrong. Especially if they are not as
L’Shma as those doing them think they are.

Everything I read about Orthodox feminism is about empowering
women. The accolades are about Orthodoxy finally giving women a leadership role.
Nothing about giving women better ways to serve God.

I am often accused of mis-attributing ulterior motives to Orthodox
feminists. But I don’t see any other way to understand it – if over and over again one reads articles
like the one in CJN. Which talks about women’s empowerment. This seems to be
the message in every instance that Orthodox feminists challenge Orthodox tradition.

Sure, Orthodox feminists will say it is ultimately all about
serving God when they are directly challenged along those lines. But when they
are unchallenged and talk freely about their goals - it is mostly about empowering
women and a lot less about serving God. I don’t think that is arguable.

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About Me

My outlook on Judaism is based mostly on the teachings of my primary Rebbe, Rabbi Aaron Soloveichik from whom I received my rabbinic ordination. It is also based on a search for spiritual truth. Among the various sources that put me on the right path, two great philosophic works stand out: “Halakhic Man” and “Lonely Man of Faith” authored by the pre-eminent Jewish philosopher and theologian, Rabbi, Dr. Joseph B. Soloveitchik. Of great significance is Rabbi, Dr. Norman Lamm's conceptualization and models of Torah U’Mada and Dr. Eliezer Berkovits who introduced me to the world of philosophic thought. Among my early influences were two pioneers of American Elementary Torah Chinuch, Rabbis Shmuel Kaufman and Yaakov Levi. The Yeshivos I attended were Yeshivas Telshe for early high school and more significantly, the Hebrew Theological College where for a period of ten years, my Rebbeim included such great Rabbinic figures as Rabbis Mordechai Rogov, Shmaryahu Meltzer, Yaakov Perlow, Herzl Kaplan, and Selig Starr. I also attended Roosevelt University where I received my Bachelor's Degree - majoring in Psychology.